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Newman and-bust-up ventures that was the president that the stand today
that the tough as Jim of that and that that the Internet a percentage of
others and the
city and the dark enough to that of the hands of the site of a percent
of others and let a touch of intervention of the things that have
launched a condition of
his numbers that are and that other team players and a letter to the
land that the wisdom that others to another pursuit of the batting
average of the Indians and
citizen on in the team's data on the left of each one of the sun is
just an optimistic that I like the letter incident and that the that
have that much of their
event for Saturday that that intention of letters to the gym that are
the others to transportation budget analyst and then the other side of
that other than that
of attention of the letter that the the the defendant and that the city
delete them that it update on that one of the fact that owns the end of
the land-use to live
up to date of the governor's budget, and led the round of the
city's was a time to coast of the tub of the civil air conditioner
and as a book that he declined our
copy of the little creature of .(SPEAKER CHANGES) The city that was one
of your home is time to sit up, I do to give you the time that the
information was a signal that the two of
the letter to the level for the single digits since the August of last
year with three of the seat of the data is touching to get into the city
and that other,
the letter to the expansion reduction of requesting a offers up to the
three others and enlarged to recover, is to the touch of the height of
the the the letter,
and to advise them that the the the actor has demanded that the that
that a lot of next biennium half and the city like the letter-writing to
us and from the
definition of the active list of configuration that are of them would
have to buy a ticket and the like that and her upbeat have been, and the
commissioner
of the judge that the co- lead that led her to leave-it-after mail them
to the defense, definitions.(SPEAKER CHANGES) And it will argue that you
are right click and where is it
enough memory to Tysons the city's Latino and added that the idea
that are to be that a lot of the apple of the reductions from anybody
who can sing that have
become a document that the governor believes, the contingent to the
brink of that a lot of the letter of the season of peace, love the time
was one of the time
the Lakers are others that have shut from a table in the Balkans the
city of more computing too have been a good line together the butter in
it that a lot is
today that amount that the fugitive item that a positive word for fear
that if one of your skin you're buying is to suggest that the
citizens of some of which it
does then turned back and have that in a different items, and the budget
deficit and review and to let off with you over often letters
a.............

The election to the budget is backed up in a car and I am standing tough
that day, which is, if you're an up-to learn and they will start to
the east and the
limelight and an uphill battle is time for the top row and important as
the letters that said (SPEAKER CHANGES) some of the city of audio is to
the up-to-the-bottle actually,
we're the city budget, that a single team out of the winner is
detention center-based on the net, the president and Leticia, that's
all that great deal at all
and there would be AR-one problem are tools. That budget, governors are
committing a continent of 20 am to the court can seat on the wisdom of
the movie is your
feeling numbers that other customer from the time of installation that,
and lesbian, that it would beat a team that you've said that of the
other than that of
the night of one billion dollars from other seasons and the one that
none of that year the bottom of the disease, where the Alatorre are with
that-that because
of the next line and a body in the wrong side of the book of digital
comment on each other's opinions of availability that we have to the
husbands, teams will
have to rely on them, committed to extension items of years. Which is
the singing of yellow highlighted,(SPEAKER CHANGES) a man-to-delivery
that the that the reduction pact that
Nixon, with the reality of the party needs of the upbeat assessment and
we're about, and led to let out of the tournament title and an
opinion and questions or
you will, appeared the city's long letter and has done another
letter that of the extension of the governments, that the reduction of
the standard of that and
have the vision that the data that the department of tax reduction of
the house and that is to the date of-the-and-run Internet, as Mr.
Daughters up about the
usage of the real deduction to a LAN Systems attention on this and other
than to the head-up charge that begins to the bottom of the other titles
to be with
that of the extension years that the definition travels with me here on
the lead-in-the-street other, and it is Mr. Reduction tool and,
reduction in the secondary
and primary, traders and its readers of, of the city's second story
is on the side of the Jim crow and enters the tournament west of the
best-of-charge and the
team to the citizen the launch of the update the time that are stored in
the back patio and there's a big difference among the ring of scale
of the committee
wants to limit back to reprint of ram, the amount of thing that can last
line of the house and the citizens of the data for the event that the
that the city
of letters and a lot of calls that body of the other part of the time
that Internet users realignment from operations of as to the some of the
of the letter
to the side of the nation as did that because of the season for that
type of the beat of the list of items that don't have time.........

but they do need authorization to continue. Number eight is to cover
increased fuel costs for and maintain our training for the ferry
division. Nine is the equipment replacement and repairs, again in the
ferry division. Ten allocates funds for public transportation division
for federal match dollars, and it also provides state funding for
programs not receiving federal funds. Number 11 is capital repairs and
renovations. We set aside money each year for these or DOT facilities
for repairs and renovations, as well as capital projects. The capital
ones we'll hit later. They're in our capital section, and we
also have a slide that shows the repair and renovations submitted by the
departments as part of their six year plan. Number 12 funds the Board of
Transportation based on their actual expenses. They're a little
short in the budgets based on the last few years. This gets them up to
match their actuals. Number 13, we start with the reductions, and these
funds are going to be reallocated to the things at the top of the list,
1 through 12. Adjustments to state aid team, municipalities per statute.
I will point out that this is based on our revenue estimates, which is
based on Senate bill 20. Depending on what is passed by the General
Assembly, those numbers will change. Number 14, adjustments to
anticipated federal receipts. Number 15 is a base budget adjustment for
other state agencies. There are some highway funds that go out to other
state agencies. We are adjusting the budget to match what was in their
base budget. Number 16 is a statutory change. Adjust funding for the
bridge program based on the revised revenue forecast. Number 17, this
reallocates funding for the primary maintenance. 18 is the secondary
maintenance reallocation. I planned out that a lot of those funds are
going to the general maintenance fund up above. Number 19 reduces funds
not required for a prior year: legislative increase, retirement rate
change, and hospital rate change. Last year there was a LI as well as
adjustments to the health plan and retirement. We put those in a
reserve. All of those funds were not needed, so they're being
reduced, put back into availability. Number 20 is one for this year.
It's a reduction in the retirement rate. The actuarials from the
Treasurer's office stated that they didn't need as much money
for the retirement rate for this ??, so this is a reduction based on
these actuarial calculations. And then number 21 reallocates funding for
50 administrative and 81 field positions to help the department meet
their out-sourcing targets. I'm gonna move on and talk about the
trust fund. If I go too far. Trust fund is on page 215. We have an
adjustment for debt service payments to meet what is needed based on
repayment schedule. Number 2 is a carve out for the health plan money
needed to cover individuals who are paid out of the highway trust fund.
And number 3 is all remaining money basically goes to the strategic
investment for infrastructure. And then going to the turnpike authority.
They had two items. It's on page 218. We have the payroll additive
that you saw on the highway fund, and then adjustment for debt service
obligations. All of those are receipts for it for the turnpike
authority. As I mentioned before, the capital items are listed. And it
starts on page 228. And there are ?? pages worth of capital items. If
you have specific questions on any of the capital items, I might have to
get help from the department. These are handled by our capital section.

Again following the capital you have a listing of the repairs and
renovations listed by the department estimated as part of their 6 year
plan and then finally it’s title page 15 XV. This is from our document,
it was in the introduction, but the governor’s going to propose a bond
issue for transportation and for facility infrastructure for state
government. That’s gonna be a packet that they’re working on and they’re
going to work with the General Assembly on that proposal. I think Bobby
Lewis is gonna come up and talk about the projects that DOT could
potentially fund from those bond sales if they go through but that is a
recommendation of the governor and more details will be forthcoming. So
I’m open for questions. [SPEAKER CHANGES] Any questions for Mr. Chief
from the committee. Representative Iler. [SPEAKER CHANGES] Mr. Chief, a
couple of interesting things about the budget. This was best information
that you have, but it was all based on [??] for the whole two years, I
understand. [SPEAKER CHANGES] You have the floor. [SPEAKER CHANGES] But
on the motor fuel tax based on Senate Bill 20, the first iteration of
that. Okay, but I congratulate you for using the cautious approach, the
cautious approach to the budget. Another thing, the capital for the
items seem to be mostly in the field. That doesn’t overlap for the
capital on the requests that are gonna come from the billions in Raleigh
[??]. [??] Road was on there but it all of it seemed to be in the field.
[SPEAKER CHANGES] They’re still gathering that. There won’t be general
fund support I think for any of the DOT projects. [SPEAKER CHANGES] Yes,
so this is the question. So the capital budget according to DOT is
funded through DOTs budget, so this is all the capital items for DOT.
There’s no general fund connection and you can see the first one is the
most major and that is to replace the DMV building. [SPEAKER CHANGES]
[??] [SPEAKER CHANGES] Okay, all right, and so follow up? So any
motivation of repair to the building on Wilmington Street would be under
the general, I guess under the general fund. [SPEAKER CHANGES] Mr. Baum.
[SPEAKER CHANGES] Of course we have repairs and renovations that are
funded in the general fund but with respect to the Department of
Transportation you’ll see those enumerated separately and [??] provided
it’s non general fund repairs and renovations. [SPEAKER CHANGES] Follow
up. [SPEAKER CHANGES] Follow up on a different subject possibly. The tax
and tag together, I don’t recall if I saw a $2 million increase or
decrease on tax and tag. How is that going? [SPEAKER CHANGES] From my
understanding it’s going well. The $2 million is actually a continuation
of positions that are already in place. From my understanding when those
positions were rolled out they were basically time limited and that was
to give the program a chance to evaluate their actual needs so of the 54
that they initially received the department is requesting to keep 44 of
them and that would be $2 million. If you did not keep those positions
they would roll off June 15th. Most of them in the call center from what
the commissioner has told me volume is quite high in the call center
related to this program and actually a lot of the license plate offices
because they’re paid by transaction if it’s something that they’re not
going to get paid for they’ll switch off, they send those questions to
the call center to be answered, so if someone stops into a license plate
office and has a list of questions they’ll say well, please call this
call center number and get those answered because they are driven by
transactions and that’s how they get paid. [SPEAKER CHANGES] Follow up.
[SPEAKER CHANGES] Follow up. [SPEAKER CHANGES] I’d like to see an update
from someone about how that program’s going. It was pretty controversial
when it first came in, counties were trying to opt out and all this
other kind of stuff. I’d like to get an update on how it’s going and how
many counties. It sounds like it may be going well, but I kinda, I get
more questions continuously from the constituents about that. [SPEAKER
CHANGES] Okay. [SPEAKER CHANGES] Any other questions. Representative
Tucker. [SPEAKER CHANGES] Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Just out of curiosity with all the bad weather we had this month, where
are we on the maintenance fund? [SPEAKER CHANGES] As far as snow
removal? [SPEAKER CHANGES] Snow removal, ice, the whole nine yards.
[SPEAKER CHANGES] There was something I looked at a couple weeks ago
that said that we had over, gone over our budget I believe slightly, but
I’d have to give you detailed numbers. Hopefully we’re passed that, but
we were over the $30 million set aside by I wanna say $5-6 million but
I’ll have to give you an update and get you some precise numbers.
[SPEAKER CHANGES] Any other questions or comments from the committee?
All right, thank you Mr. Sheef. [SPEAKER CHANGES] Thank you. [SPEAKER
CHANGES] Next we have a presentation from Bobby Lewis, Chief of Staff at
the Department of Transportation to talk about the governor’s
transportation bond. Mr. Lewis? [SPEAKER CHANGES] Thank you members of
the committee and chairs for having me here today to talk about the bond
program. I’m Bobby Lewis, Chief of Staff at NCDOT. Real quick, I just
wanted to mention if I do not use the words if, preliminary of initial
enough, that is, I just want everybody to know here this is not a
program that is, folks don’t like me giving analogies, but this is not a
baked cake. Nothing’s in stone yet. We need the collaboration, but with
that I’m just gonna kinda go over of what our outline of our mission and
kinda where our criteria is right now and just kinda tell you about the
inventory. So our initial mission as you’ve heard the governor say is to
further connect North Carolin’s regions to each other but also equally
as important is to protect the 10 year state transportation improvement
program. No negative impacts to that, so with that we had to develop
some type of initial criteria. How do we come up with an inventory of
projects to select from. So first of all what can be utilized quick by
the users. So something that you can put on the ground somewhat quickly
but be able to have quick utilization by the travelers of North
Carolina. So we developed sort of that inventory based on projects that
had completed environmental documents as of December of 2014 and then
our next criteria was it had to be a project that went through the
prioritization process as you’ve heard prioritization 3.0, and then the
next step would be how do you select because what I’ll give you is a big
list, a big number, but obviously it would have to be prioritized from
that big inventory list, but go through 40/30/30. You know, have the
fidelity of what STI was built around and prioritize statewide, regional
and division just as STI has. So when you look at that inventory from
December 2014 back all documents have been completed, what you’ll find
today, there’s about 85 projects that have completed environmental
documents and I think in round numbers what was submitted through
prioritization 3.0 was about 1,300. So 85 of those had completed
documents. What we did was if you think about it, some of those, there
was 28 of those completed environmental documents that were funded in
the STIP, state transportation improvement program, in the first 5
years, so 2016-2020. So that’s 28 of those. Now if, and again using the
word if, if a bond program is passed and we all agree to that, those
projects we did not include in this inventory that I’ll describe and the
reason why is that most of those 28 projects are funded in 16, 17 or 18,
so that’s about the time that a bond program once it goes through its
process would be delivered anyway. So with that what is the inventory
cause I told you 28 of them are in the first 5 years. There’s three to

Actually in the year 6-10 of the state transportation improvement
program and then another 54 that did not get prioritized, so that’s 57
projects total that equate to about $3.1 billion. To put that in mileage
for the state, that’s about 210 miles and the majority of those,
obviously, are the new capacity, widening and bypasses. Of that if I
take the STI lingo so to speak, what we all know, statewide projects
from that list of 57 is about 37 projects. There’s about 14 regional
projects and then there’s about 6 division projects. The statewide
projects equate that are in the inventory of about $2.5 billion, the 14
regional projects equate to about $500 million and the 6 divisional
projects equate to about $100 million. All of that is statewide. The
majority of these projects as we went through, you know, the formation
of STI in 2013, I think most of you all remember the loop program and
the interstate program, so you being familiar with transportation, a lot
of the projects that you’ll see on this $3 billion list are, by and
large a lot of them are from the loop program and the interstate
program. Now, I think it’s important to say what does this not include
because I said prioritization 3.0, a lot of those type projects are your
new capacity type projects, so it does not include like the non-highway
projects, so that would be the bike and ped, that would be the aviation,
the rail, PTD type projects or transit I mean. It does not include
projects like interstate rehabilitation or US route rehabilitation which
is basically just maintaining what you have, strengthening that 4 lane
or 6 lane facility. It does not include bridge replacement projects
cause any of those could have completed documents. That’s why I didn’t
want to be remiss and not mention that, but it’s keen to say that 2014
in December is when we sorta had to cut offline for this, at this point
in time so obviously there’s probably some projects that I don’t have a
number to today but may have environmental documents completed as of
January 2015 to now and then I think I would be remiss if I didn’t
mention some successes from STI is there’s 3 divisions that do not have
a completed environmental document in this list that I give and that’s
from division 4 which is sort of in the northern part of I95, you have
division 11 that’s out there towards the western part of North Carolina
and also division 14. But they did have a menu of projects in the first
5 years of the 28 I briefly described, they did have projects in there
and they will be delivered in the first 5 years of our state
transportation improvement program. So next steps? Because as I
mentioned this project inventory’s about $3.1 billion obviously we have
to decide how big is this bond, what is the debt affordability? So is
that $1 billion, is it $1.2 billion? What is that number and then
prioritize based on that inventory list and then obviously Thomas was
just up here, what is our expected revenue? There’s still uncertainty
there and that obviously has an impact on the calculation of what we can
afford and then more importantly I’d like to end off in saying this will
as we bake the cake it requires continuous and constant collaboration
with you here at the table, the General Assembly as a whole, obviously
us as state agencies and also we, more importantly we also need to
engage to industry and see what we’re able to bite off here and that’s
my comments. [SPEAKER CHANGES] Questions or comments from the committee?
Representative [??] [SPEAKER CHANGES] Okay, so, thank you. So these
projects are projects that would move above the line, above the

If we pass the line, is that kind of a general statement there? [SPEAKER
CHANGES] These projects when you say move above the line, be able to
receive funding, yes sir, yes sir. And some that I mentioned that’s in
the inventory. There’s three project that they already were above the
line, that they already had completed environmental documents so that’s
why they were included. [SPEAKER CHANGES] Follow up? [SPEAKER CHANGES]
Follow up on a different subject. This question I’ve asked for about
four years I think and this is a question on Mecklenberg that I probably
meant to ask, but I’ve been asking about the 45 missing link, the 45 to
Charlotte, what’s the, I think there’s already someone under contract.
They’re working on it. What’s the completion date at this point.
[SPEAKER CHANGES] Let me get the exact date and I’ll get that to you
within an hour. Before you get out of this room I’ll have the exact
date. [SPEAKER CHANGES] Senator. [SPEAKER CHANGES] Thank you. My
apologies, Senator. [SPEAKER CHANGES] Thank you Mr. Lewis. You and I
talked about this before. In 1989 the Highway Trust Fund proposed these
urban loops around our major cities one that was discussed in my
district that folks have been waiting for for 20-30 years. Going
forward, and they still can’t tell me when it’s going to be completed,
going forward are you guys looking at how to prioritize what really is a
priority and going forward do you have plans going on to take care of
those situations for those folks who have just been waiting out there.
To me that’s a priority that they’ve been waiting so long. [SPEAKER
CHANGES] Yes, ma’am. I was expecting that question. [SPEAKER CHANGES] I
know you were. [SPEAKER CHANGES] What I will say first is on the
inventory list that is a project among many of the other loop projects
that is on this inventory list. To go back to the bigger question that’s
statewide, you know, defining that problem. Now, what I will say is this
STI I think over time we’re in a transition of where we had a loop
program and an interstate program that was in legislation. It required
NCDOT to work on those projects. It was not a prioritization, it was a
prioritization of the program back then. I think STI going forward, I’m
not saying it would happen tomorrow, but going forward in years you,
because pretty much what STI does, you prioritize where you’re going to
apply resources to and that includes planning, environmental documents
to right of way and so forth, so going forward if it does not prioritize
to STI then it will not show up as a project that we can start planning
on. [SPEAKER CHANGES] Thank you. [SPEAKER CHANGES] Yes, ma’am. [SPEAKER
CHANGES] As a reminder there is also a list of projects that have gone
through the environmental process on the website for the committee.
Representative Bumgardner. [SPEAKER CHANGES] Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I
have a question or two. I wanna ask you a question that some of my
constituents have been asking me, are we not taking projects that
already have passed their environmental reviews but didn’t make the cut
on STI and now we wanna pass a bond referendum to fund some of these
projects. That’s the question I’ve been getting and I wanna be able to
give people an answer straight from the source, so if you could answer
that I’d appreciate it. [SPEAKER CHANGES] Yes, sir, what I would say
your question is are there projects being elevated that did not make the
line? Am I repeating the question. [SPEAKER CHANGES] Yes, in a way, yes.
[SPEAKER CHANGES] Okay, so again, the original criteria was inventory
projects with completed documents. Now, so would they, did they
prioritize with other 57, 54, no, sir, they did not, so will they go
forward in front of projects that did prioritize higher? Yes, sir, I
mean

just to be blunt, that would be the case. However, what I will say is
that a resolute question is how far could we have went if we had a
little more revenue, where would the line have been? That was a line
that was based on the revenue that we had today.
[SPEAKER CHANGES]
Follow-up.
[SPEAKER CHANGES]
Follow-up.
[SPEAKER CHANGES]
Well that's always the issue. There's always got to be a point
in time, if you're building a house or if you're buying
groceries, there's a point where you've got to draw a line and
say, "We can't go past this. If we had a little more money we
could go a little bit further." There will always be that, and so
I'm getting quizzed about why are we doing this and is this like
going to the butcher shop and the butcher's got his finger on the
scales while he's weighing up whatever it is you're buying.
That's my point.
[SPEAKER CHANGES]
Would you like further comment from him or is there a question that
you'd like to, or is that a comment for the committee? Thank you,
sir. Representative Torbett.
[SPEAKER CHANGES]
Thank you. I have a question of Bobby, Mr. Lewis, thanks. Would it be a
fair statement to say that one of the reasons that the bond project list
is moving or appears to be moving at a faster pace is simply because
it's already cleared environmental hurdles? All projects are moving
forward. These projects have just already had a lot of the red tape
associated on the front-end taken care of, so it appears as if
they're moving at a faster clip than all the rest of the projects.
Would that be a fair statement?
[SPEAKER CHANGES]
Yes, sir. That would be a fair statement.
[SPEAKER CHANGES]
Any other questions or comments from the committee? Alright, with that
we are adjourned.